This was the question posed to a group of my colleagues as regards the merits of US fiscal and monetary policy: guess who has the most debt in the US economy? Everyone at the table said ‘the government’. When most pundits talk of ‘government debt’ they are inherently referring to federal government, who is not […]
Today Eurostat released its unemployment rate figures for the month of August. The Euro area unemployment rate held firm at 11.4% for the third consecutive month. Spain still has the highest unemployment rate in the euro area, 25.1%, and Greece is catching up quickly, 24.4% (in June, which is the latest data point). The chart below illustrates […]
Yesterday, the Financial Times reported that borrowing costs for small businesses in the periphery were rising relative to the core using the ECB’s release of July MFI interest rate data. I highlighted this point exactly on August 1 following Draghi’s now famous London speech, where he cautioned that monetary transmission mechanism is ‘hampered’. As opposed […]
Today Statistics Netherlands (CBS) warned “House Prices Nosedive“. Prices of existing owner-occupied dwellings sold in July 2012 were on average 8.0 percent down from July 2011. This is the most substantial price drop since the price index of existing residential property was first recorded in 1995. In real terms and indexed to 2005, home values are […]
Eurostat released trade figures today, where the trade balance (exports less imports) surged €3.7 bn in the month of June (link to the .pdf release). The current figures imply a 2012 annualized trade balance of €66.9 bn, which is a meaningful boost to the -€7.4 bn deficit in 2011. Eurostat breaks down the regional figures further into intra-Euro […]
The NY Times reports quite a dire situation as regards the slump in the value of Chinese exports to the European Union in July: Data published this month showed that China’s exports to the European Union had sunk 16.2 percent in July to $29.4 billion, compared with July 2011. This statistic (bolded by yours truly) […]
Something different for today: world trade. Recently, South Korea and Taiwan released July 2012 trade statistics, where annual export growth was seen contracting at a 8.8% and 11.6% rate, respectively. The annual pace of export growth in Taiwan contracted for the fifth consecutive month, where that in South Korea turned negative following a 1.1% annual […]
Today Eurostat released its June estimate of real retail sales for the Euro area. On a month/month basis, real retail sales increased at a rate of 0.1%. However, on a trended basis, the 3-month/3-month average growth rate was down 0.7% in the three months ending in June. Given that the 3-month trended pace of contraction quickened […]
Mario Draghi cautioned on the ‘hampered’ transmission channel of monetary policy in his now famous London speech last week: To the extent that the size of these sovereign premia hampers the functioning of the monetary policy transmission channel, they come within our mandate. I referred to the clogging of rates policy back in April via […]
France’s INSEE business confidence, Germany’s Ifo business climate, and the National Bank of Belgium’s business survey demonstrate ongoing infection as the Euro area debt crisis hits business expectations in the core. Through July, business confidence in Germany and France continued to slide while that in Belgium rebounded, albeit from a low base. Of note, the […]